THE FIFTH DEGREE

1. If you were casting a movie using people currently qualified for the Pro Tour, who would you cast for the role of hero and villain?

Probably [Brian] Kibler for hero because he always seem like the one that everyone loves to love. I want Brad Nelson and Todd Anderson to be his sidekicks for the obnoxious sweet humor factor and because I would want them to be my sidekicks. A villian seems difficult but I’m going to go with anyone who just bitches too much on Twitter, ha-ha, so … sorry PV. Mind you, I know none of them personally yet soooo I could just have the wrong idea.

2. Tell us something which has occurred in your life that people might find surprising.

For the first four years of my life I was convinced I only had one toe. It turned out it was my penis and I was confused about where my foot was.

3. The zombie apocalypse is happening now. Which three people in the MTG fellowship do you choose as backup?

I’m picking four, and it should be obvious … The Eh Team is the perfect combination of brains, brawn, and sexy.

4. What will the world look like in 50 years?

Round.

5. If I could give you one Magical take back what would it be?

Probably just to have never quit and still have tons of fetchlands from Onslaught.

QUESTION & ANSWER

Q: Pack 1, Pick 1? Wonder Woman / Catwoman / Supergirl

Is Bat Boy not an option? Refer to Figure 1 below:

Figure 1:

Q: Who the heck are you?

Refer to Figure 1.

Q: Tell me about your start-up company, Sign in Blood Spell Books:

I started working on Sign in Blood in October of last year. My inspiration stemmed from going to tournaments and not having a good life management system. There are always dice or your cell phone but you can’t reliably track how you got from Point A to Point B. I also noticed other players using notepads but they were generic, usually cumbersome, and didn’t really fit the table right for gaming. I was drawn to Magic because the game is very tactile. Players like having things in their hands. I felt using notepads lent itself well to a more hands-on type of game. I wanted to come up with something completely new that was both cool and functional.

Q: What are your hopes for your company?

Well more than anything, I want to make something that Magic players can identify with as their own. I really want to take the company into a more clothing and lifestyle direction, so that players can have something to wear that identifies them as Magic players but doesn’t look so, for lack of a better term, “nerdy.” I would love to wear a T-shirt that looks cool and lets others who play Magic know I play, but without having some obnoxious picture of a wizard on it. We also really want to help facilitate the game as a third party that can provide extra sponsorship income so players can actually make a living playing Magic professionally. I feel companies like ours are necessary for this because Wizards can’t support all of the players on their own. I also feel like it’s not their place because people don’t really want to wear a shirt that just says “Magic: The Gathering” on it — that doesn’t say anything about them. That’s like being a baseball fan and wearing a shirt that says “baseball” or being a MMA fan and wearing shorts that say “UFC.” It doesn’t say anything about you or what you like, so we want to give Magic players a new way to identify with the game.

Q: Why this venture?

Because I love playing Magic and I love creating things. If I can do both, I don’t see how it gets much better than that.

Q: Innovation around MTG is at an all-time high. Brian Kibler helped create Solforge with the creator of MTG. Eric Freytag has invested heavily in PucaTrade, hoping to revolutionize how we trade Magic cards. MTG alterists are making a career out of painting cardboard. What is it about right now that we are seeing such an entrepreneurial boom?

Right now Magic is bigger than its ever been. In fact, Hasbro has stated that sales have tripled in the last two blocks, so its growing even faster than ever. This coupled with having a game that seems to draw in intellectual and creative people seems to just breed these opportunities.

Q: Has this project been an easy venture for you to get under way or a challenge?

Both. It takes a lot of resources in the beginning, both monetary and plain-old knowhow. There was a lot of trial and error and figuring out the proper channels to navigate through was a lot more difficult than anticipated. But I feel like my perseverance and genuine enthusiasm made it easy to get others excited about my project, which opened up a lot of doors initially.

Q: How have you been marketing your product? What have you found works best?

Honestly nowadays there doesn’t seem to be any better way than social media. People are going to like what they like, not what marketers tell them to, and they are a lot smarter than they used to be. We market through Facebook a lot, but I feel like it is more just talking about Magic than actually marketing.

Q: How did you pick up your first Magic: the Gathering card?

Well back in the day there was the Star Wars TCG and I loved to play that. Around the time of Odyssey, Wizards bought that game from Decipher and totally killed it, leaving me in the market for a new game. Then I found Magic and I ended up liking it better than I liked the Star Wars game in the first place.

Q: What does your Magic collection look like?

It’s not that exciting. Seeing as how I started seriously playing again only a year ago, most of it is all Standard. I have a Modern UWR Geist deck, but it’s definitely not to impressive … I’m working on it.

Q: Tell me about the happiest time in your life.

I’d have to say now! Everything is going perfect for me — I have a job that is working out just fine right now, an awesome girlfriend, and I’m having a blast with this company, so I can’t really imagine it getting much better.

Q: Tell me about the lowest point in your life.

This one is hard, lol.

Q: If you could sum your childhood up in one word, what would it be?

BORING.

Q: Why this word?

I hated being a kid; I always feel like I was born to be an adult. I was miserable not being able to do what I wanted to do when I wanted and being at the mercy of your parents spending hours in Home Depot every weekend was never where I wanted to be. I just wanted to do my own thing, even when I was 5.

Q: Anything else you would like to add?

I’m actively looking to hang out with any local players who want to chill and go out or whatever on any Grand Prix stops. It’s cool meeting new people, so if you see us at any events stop by and say what’s up and let’s go get a drink!

Social Snapshots

Who else is unimpressed with the guild leaders next to the Gruul one? he is insane and the rest are just mehhh..what do you guys think?